Playground 2: Swings and Roundabouts
by Codename Deus
Summary: Having survived the earthquake that leveled Goldenrod City, The Prototype has now got to find his beloved mate The Dark Clone somewhere within the post apocalyptic warzone the city has become. With the nefarious Blackwatch and shambling infected running amok, the task to find her and escape the quarantine is made even harder. Both know he is there...but can he fight them all off?
1. All Hope is Gone

**Playground 2: Swings and Roundabouts**

(As with the first Playground story, here is an advanced warning to all readers that there will be numerous scenes featuring intense violence, blood and gore as well as horror, and to expect frequent use of bad language including the f word and infrequent use of the c word. If none of these issues concern you in any way, read on and enjoy -Codename Deus-)

All Hope is Gone:

Playground:**  
><strong>_-an area used for outdoor play or recreation, especially by children, and often containing recreational equipment such as slides and swings._

Swings and Roundabouts:**  
><strong>_-to describe a situation in which there are as many advantages as there are disadvantages._

The room was cold, dark and featureless. The lack of a window on any of the walls did little to turn the tide of isolation while a single, pathetic light bulb hung from its lighting fixture welded to the ceiling. It barely illuminated anything at all with its suffering beam.  
>Bricks in various states of disrepair were strewn across the dusty floor along with other assortments of unidentifiable rubble, not a piece of ground one would choose to walk on given choice.<p>

However, an old nearby rustic steel door opened with a painful squawk. In stepped two Machamp Super Soldiers, each wielding iron pipes in their large, armour covered paws.  
>The sound of breathing could easily be heard filtering through their visor clad helmets and white body armour, giving out a Darth Vader-esque quality about them.<p>

They wandered towards the centre of the room, minding the gathering of rubble as they went. With their eyes trained on the ground for the moment, they came across a pool of fresh crimson blood. It was still fed by further drops directly from a source suspended off of the ground.

Looking up, they noticed with gleeful smiles a hooded figure bounded with chains around his wrists and shins to a pair of support columns. He was clearly unconscious, with blood dripping from his head, mouth and bullet holes in his torso. His tail appeared squirrel like. It was long with three 'spikes' while his tail and ears were coloured a shade of crimson with unique swirling patterns upon them.

One Machamp Super Soldier stepped forwards, harshly prodding the figure clad in a black hooded coat with his iron pipe. With a stirred groan and a grunt, the hooded figure, known to the world as The Prototype or Codename Deus, awakened. His ice blue eyes slowly surveyed the archaic room, his breaths drawn and heavy. Every breath taken hurt his rib cage and he pulled on the chains. Usually, his strength would have been too much for the binding, but due to his somewhat weakened state he could barely muster the energy to move at all. He coughed violently from his injuries that also caused him to spit up more blood as a result. His eyes then came across the pair of Super Soldiers before him at last, looking upon each of them in turn.

The look in his eyes quickly turned to hate as the Super Soldiers ushered in a comrade, the newly installed Blackwatch commander Brett Cole. He immediately stared piercingly at The Prototype through his black mask and glowing blue visors.

"So...Codename Deus, is it? Welcome to your interrogation..." Cole began. A cocky smirk played up on his fresh young face behind his mask and helmet. The male Pachirisu ignored him, save for a few barely manageable grunts.

The Blackwatch commander rather predictably pressed forwards and mercilessly slapped the butt of his Assault Rifle forcefully into The Prototype's wounded stomach, causing him further discomfort. He wheezed in pain as blood spilled from his mouth with some splashing against Cole's military armour.

"If you refuse to cooperate, I'm afraid we will have to take extreme measures against that twisted fucking body of yours. I assure you, the turn of events will not be pleasant." Cole explained rather cruelly, the smirk extending on his face as his words filtered through his mask.

The Prototype however shook his head and stubbornly refused to comply, going so far as to look away at one of the bland walls.

"OK if that's the way you wish to fucking play it, Deus I guess I have no other options." Cole remarked frankly. He then proceeded to smash the butt of his gun against the male Pachirisu's crotch and private areas, causing him to yelp in pain.

"I don't expect to see you ejaculate upon being...fondled in such a way, but I expect you to spill answers, and I want answers right fucking now!" The Blackwatch commander demanded crudely, his masked face sticking to The Prototype's own in an attempt to intimidate.

"You have more chance of licking my ass, you prick..." The male Pachirisu spoke out barely, displaying that the pain and intimidation was rendered for nothing.

Brett Cole was having none of it however and once again made use of the butt of his gun. He slammed it against the restrained Pachirisu across his face. The Prototype's mouth spewed yet more blood as his head rocked to the side with Cole watching on with satisfaction.

"Now you will tell me who you are affiliated with and you will tell me the identity of that other Pachirisu you seem to hang around with. If you want to keep these silly little games going I will be happy to keep humouring you, brah." The feisty Blackwatch commander again ordered expectantly. His expectations continued to shatter like feeble glass however as the male Pachirisu remained adamant in his refusal to cooperate. At that point he even refused to look Cole in the eye.

Brett refused to simply give up and struck The Prototype in the stomach with his fist, making the Pachirisu grimace in response and cough violently again.

"Now are you willing to talk to your good friends and Blackwatch and I, brah?" Cole inquired forcefully without sympathy, taunting the male Pachirisu with his general tone of voice. The Prototype suddenly glared up at him rather cruelly, finally ending his coughing fit and weakly pulling on the chains that bound him.

"I'm telling you cunts nothing...and if you say brah one more time I will break your fucking face!" He roared shortly after and suddenly began coughing again after straining his voice. He spat out more blood as his raised voice pained his wounded chest. Cole chuckled at The Prototype's threat before becoming more serious again.

"This fucking little cocksucker isn't gonna spill any information we want..." Cole uttered out of frustration and then gestured by hand to the pair of Super Soldiers to knock the hooded Pachirisu back into unconsciousness again.

As the Super Soldiers stood beside him, Brett took the opportunity to move his masked face within mere inches of The Prototype's own.

"You may think you're invincible wherever you go...but you're just a fucking asshole. We're always watching you...anywhere you go..." The commander remarked threateningly. Then he stepped back and trudged out of the room, cursing as he went.

The Super Soldiers watched him leave before turning their attention back to the wounded and bound Pachirisu, both shaking their heads at him. The Prototype glared blankly at the both of them as if to expect the inevitable.

He predicted correctly as the full force of an iron pipe slammed into the side of his face. It caused his head to rock violently to the side with blood spewing from his mouth, down his chin and across his unaffected cheek. The disconcerting sound of the resulting blood drops could be heard thudding against the floor while the male Pachirisu struggled for a fresh breath.

He realised his jaw may have been broken from the forceful blow although before he could find out, a brutal blow to his stomach further winded him. It reassigned him his unconsciousness as he rocked back with a pull on the chains. His eyes drooped and shuttered with his head lazily flopping forwards.

Re-entering unconsciousness, a flashback hit him as his own voice seemed to play in his mind.  
>"I...I remember vividly the moment when GENTEK hired me. There I was, sat at a conference table across from two high ranking, uniformed Blackwatch Soldiers. A rather thin but smartly dressed blonde man sat between them. I assumed he was the CEO of GENTEK and alongside him sat a female Zoroark. If my mind serves me correctly she said her name was Nadia Velazquez. What purpose she served remains a mystery to me, but I assume her role was important.<p>

They had all somehow discovered that I had taken a particular interest in the way the human body works from a young age, not to mention Pokémon as well. They had also caught wind that I had become somewhat of a nerd in my loneliness. I quickly became vastly knowledgeable in the fields of biology and medicine despite only being eleven years of age at the time. A lot of reading in your field of interest can help with that. They wanted me for that knowledge and for me to become just one piece of a team of expert scientists. This was for a top secret project they were planning. It was a never before attempted project. It was a project they dubbed Blacklight.

At the time I knew nothing of the project and the employers before me neglected to reveal even a single snippet of information. However, being assured that my knowledge would be put to good use, I accepted the proposition. At the time I remember gazing around the well furnished, modern room, but could clearly smell the stench of science laboratories. This only served to compel me further. Blacklight was well and truly underway as a project and I could not wait to begin..."


	2. Ruination Part 1

**Ruination (Part 1):****  
><strong>The Prototype awakened once again, groggily so but immediately aware that he was free from his shackles. He immediately looked up and around, noticing the distinct lack of any BlackWatch military soldiers in the nearby vicinity at least.

With that in mind, the male Pachirisu noted his location, a children's playground. It was complete with a merry go round, a set of swings and a slide, all seemingly covered in an ash like substance.

Looking up, he noticed the sky dark and gloomy, filled with black, menacing thunderclouds that blocked out the sun almost entirely. From these clouds descended many large and dense flakes. These consisted not of snow however, but that of dull grey ash.

The effects of radiation was telling, the appalling stench of a nearby poisoned water source made itself known as it shot up The Prototype's nose unwelcomingly…but he ignored it.  
>Instead, he favoured a gaze at the area around him, immediately noting the set of swings, the large slide and the merry go round all decked with more clinging, slow falling ash. Around the children's playground was a large and very dead park like area, grass taken over by a thick blanket of ash and barren, lonely trees entirely stripped of their leaves and life. They looked hallowed, gothic even in their bare isolation, while the city around the park was nothing if not a scene of utter devastation.<p>

Easily noticeable were the scattered remains of once glorious buildings, some leaving their skeleton like framework still standing. Paper from the various office buildings had been scattered over the derelict streets and park, while a large number of cars and vehicles spread across the streets in various stages of damage and disrepair. Other buildings that were still standing had sizeable portions missing in their structures, with framework jutting out messily and flames burning quietly within the wreckage like large, battered variations of the Olympic torch.

Lampposts, some bent or leaning over continuously shot sparks down onto the broken streets below and traffic lights at the various intersections had gone haywire, juxtaposing and flickering from red to yellow to green and in reverse with no configured timing in between.

The Prototype noted every component of the devastation, remembering the insane and powerful earthquake levelling practically the entire city.  
>Groggily, he slowly looked up to spot a little boy standing above him. His black hair flickered in the wind descending from the dust obscured sky above, his blank white t-shirt and black shorts shimmering a little.<p>

The football he held above his head was thrown downwards, accompanied with childish laughter. The ball hit the male Pachirisu directly on his head and bounced away, causing a drawn out sound of squelching to make itself known as the Pachirisu groaned.

The boy laughed as he wandered away, while the children's playground around him suddenly looked occupied. Children happily slid down the slide, swinging with fair speed upon the swings and pushing one another around the merry go round obliviously. The Prototype looked around curiously with the sound of a child's laughter ringing in his ears.  
>The children did not seem to notice the presence of the male Pachirisu, instead focussed on the intent of their amusement.<p>

Truth was, they were never actually there and The Prototype himself only realised this a few minutes afterwards, noting only an entirely deserted area and a large, loosened chunk of building debris laying on the ground before him. This confirmed in his mind that it was indeed not a child using his head as a spring for their ball, rather just the building debris no doubt violently ejected from its former home.

The male Pachirisu took the opportunity to look around once more, particularly behind him to notice a long crimson trail of blood leading up to his position, indicating he was mercilessly dragged to his location doubtlessly by BlackWatch.

He grunted from pain as a result of his numerous wounds and began to crawl towards the swings for stability, his movement causing further wet smears of blood to be left on the ash laden ground behind him, glistening in the dulled down sunlight from behind the dust clouds and particles in the sky. After a few moments, he reached and grabbed onto one of the support posts belonging to the swings with his blood soaked paws to balance himself in the hope that he could slowly scramble onto his feet.

Carefully, he allowed himself onto his feet with a grunt, hoping his balance would not give out. He took a few steps forward, but lurched forward without warning and collapsed onto his side as he wheezed.  
>He looked towards the swings as they mysteriously began to gain momentum and swing in opposite directions with agonising squeaks of seeming anarchy.<p>

The Prototype's eyes raised in surprise, himself wondering just how wrong the leftovers of Goldenrod City felt.  
>The reverberation of a young child's laughter drowned his ears for just a moment. He glanced around…nobody. He was alone and heavily wounded, attempting to scoop himself onto his feet again as the pendulum like swings of the swing set slowly dulled and ceased altogether.<p>

He did so, supporting his weight atop his feet as would be considered normal, preparing to trudge his first steps upon the park's ash smothered grass.  
>As he prepared to do so, he turned his head to notice a Pachirisu sitting on one of the swings. The Pachirisu's paws gripped the chains holstering the swing to the upper support, the swing itself swaying ever so slightly. Its back faced The Prototype and his position, remaining silent…doing very little.<p>

The Prototype began slowly staggering towards the Pachirisu figure out of curiosity, its ears flicking sensitively as a response.  
>"Son…what have you become?" The Pachirisu asked of him, the warped voice revealing its gender as a female. The hooded male Pachirisu stopped suddenly in his tracks, surprised to hear the manner in which he was addressed.<br>"Mum?" He uttered questionably, having deduced the manner of her addressing.  
>The Pachirisu, pale blue of ear and tail fur, nodded having confirmed he was indeed correct in his assumption, though never turned around to face him.<br>"I'm so disappointed in you…" Her distinct, echoing voice uttered, though sounded as if she was going to continue. The Prototype however, spoke up first.  
>"But…I…I never wanted to…turn out like this. I swear it…" He remonstrated his reasoning, placing his paw over his face for just a moment to hold back his tears.<p>

When he drew the paw away from his face and looked up again, his mother had gone, having disappeared without warning.  
>"Mother?" The Prototype called to no avail, having not concluded what he wanted to say. Tears aligned the base of his eyes as his mind mulled over what he had just been told, mixed in with his concern about the one he loves, the female Pachirisu The Dark Clone whom BlackWatch's soldiers left behind at the beach in which they had apprehended The Prototype on.<p>

While the thoughts continued running through his head like the repetition of television shows, The Prototype turned around, away from the children's playground. He then groggily staggered a few steps before tripping under his own feet and hitting his lower face against a fallen telephone pole, causing his jaw to violently dislocate and for blood to spurt from his mouth.

He violently punched the ground out of copious frustration as he lay awkwardly there for a few moments, causing fallen ash to jolt into the air like thick dust.  
>"Fuck…" He uttered in addition to his fit of frustration and placed both paws against his lower cheeks. He then vigorously began pulling one way until a loud click was heard, snapping his jaw back into place as more blood leaked from his mouth.<br>"Dammit…" The Prototype remarked as he adjusted to the pain, slowly and surely scooping himself back onto his feet yet again.

What was more, he spotted a tunnel nearby, planting a way through the small hill it occupied and doubtlessly into a different district of Goldenrod City. Inside it looked dark, lifeless even, with only more crashed and abandoned cars, buses and other vehicles littering the cracked and buckled roads. Sparks tumbled from the various damaged lights upon the ceiling of the tunnel, showering the slanted, uneven tarmac of the roads with hot, glowing shards.

The male Pachirisu, having stopped to survey the innards of the tunnel set out before him, ventured inside, his steps still holding a hint of staggering in them as he began to cope with the pain of his numerous leaking wounds.  
>He looked down for a moment, clasping his paw tightly against his chest as blood further soaked into it.<br>"Ugh…" He wheezed solemnly in his pain, stopping for a brief moment to catch his breath before continuing onwards again.

When he looked up again, he caught sight of a small figure standing in the middle of the road with its back turned to The Prototype. It wore a tattered scientist's uniform over its torso as well as having a large, long tail topped with three spike like protrusions.  
>Through the darkness the figure could only be made out as a silhouette, so the male Pachirisu rolled the dice with his chances and took a few steps towards the figure.<br>"You…my son. The one and only…disillusioned me with what you have become." The figure uttered in a low, foreboding male voice. The Prototype then immediately deduced the figure as his father and noted the pale red colouring of the figure's ears and tail.  
>"What…father, what do you mean?" The Prototype inquired as he stared forward a little more, obviously by now having noted the figure as a fellow, more matured Pachirisu.<br>"No closer…you tarnish and wash the family name with disgrace…" The figure of his father remarked rather bitterly, dispelling his own son's presence as a mere obstacle.

The Prototype looked down as if he was ashamed of himself. When he looked up again, his father had vanished, nowhere to be seen. He felt upset suddenly, his thoughts clashing and then collaborating the opinions of his mother and father together, meshing as one to formulate The Prototype's sadness.

He dropped to his knees and then eventually, to his paws as well. His lower lip quivered uncontrollably as tears filled his pale blue eyes. He felt distraught at being coined with such scathing verbal ferocity from his own parents whom he knew very little of throughout his life.

Finally, the tears began to overflow like a burst water pipe as they escaped and rolled down his cheeks.  
>"I…I never wanted this to happen to me." He whimpered, a cold lonely feeling trickling down his neck and spine. His tears trickled off of his cheeks like warm raindrops, still wondering why his mother and father had stated what they had said.<p>

"All I ever had been was a lowly book worm…" He reminded himself audibly, remembering his pastime as a youngster vividly as if they were bars of pure gold.

He relented his sadness shortly afterwards, however hard that seemed to be and raised himself painfully back onto his feet again. With that, he began hobbling onwards while clutching his chest with his paw to dull the pain transmitting from it, onwards towards the opposite side of the tunnel. He could already make out more flakes of ash smothering the ground almost completely like a soft, almost feathered carpet.

Finally reaching the end of the tunnel, The Prototype stopped for a moment to survey the area and the scene could not seem more similar than before the tunnel had devoured him into its dark recesses.

The City Hall, its grounds and gardens laden with copious amounts of ash, stood barely to his left with innumerable portions detached and missing, its dome in particular lopsided and immensely damaged. Every other building in the vicinity remained as nothing but battered skeletal frameworks. Debris of buildings and their contents crammed the buckled streets, leaving the ground uneven and hazardous.

Above, the so called heavens had well and truly opened up, pouring mucky, ash choked rain and shooting bolts of forked lightning spectacularly towards the ground like a morbid fireworks display…


	3. Ruination Part 2

**Ruination (Part 2):**  
>Once The Prototype had concluded his general survey of the area, his eyes were drawn to a scene of harrowing proportions, detailing a young and restrained woman up against a set of sandbags and bound from her wrists. Her long blonde hair and green dress waved in the wind silently, blood spattered upon them like an unorthodox crimson mask. The binding of chains upon her wrists clamped not only to the sandbags but also terra firma itself and she screamed as a pair of BlackWatch soldiers approached her, one with a razor sharp circular power saw clutched firmly within his broad arms.<br>"No please...you don't have to do this..." She pleaded desperately, squirming uncomfortably in her shackles.  
>"Oh but fair lady we do have to fucking do this...remove her arm..." One of the BlackWatch soldier pair grunted before ordering his comrade to amputate her swollen arm. The other nodded and activated the power saw, the blade whirring into life with a headache inducing, grinding soundtrack.<br>"Wh...why do you have to do this?" The woman inquired barely and hastily in her panicking to the tune of laughter from the two BlackWatch soldiers as she continued to squirm pathetically in fear.  
>"You have become infected...with a contagious variant of a virus known as Blacklight, not helped by the doses of radiation around this city...and the removal of your arm would ensure it cannot spread into your body...anymore fucking questions?"<p>

The woman shook her head, still completely bewildered about just what the pair of BlackWatch soldiers had hoped to gain with what they were doing as they both approached her, power saw still whirring enthusiastically. She grimaced from the thought of impending pain, knowing there was no way out as the saw made contact with her arm just below the elbow and gruesomely began breaching it.

The woman screamed as blood gushed profusely from the cutting and began coating the BlackWatch soldiers in a moist crimson hue. The soldiers merely smirked from behind their masks as the woman's pain reached its peak with her screaming from the agony.

Eventually, once the arteries, muscle and bone had been severed one by one, her dismembered arm dropped to the blood soaked ground and twitched barely. The now blood covered BlackWatch soldiers nodded at one another to signal that the deed was done and shut off the power saw.  
>"Now you're fucking cleansed. Next time, be more fucking careful of what you are doing." One uttered in a completely spiteful and unsympathetic manner.<br>"Are you not going to cauterise the amputation?" The woman asked bravely as she watched the blood spurting continuously from the stump that was once home to an entire arm rather than just a mere half.  
>"Cauterise it yourself..." The other soldier remarked equally spitefully as the first soldier began cutting the woman free of her shackles.<p>

What happened next would startle the woman even further as a long silver blade was drawn against the second soldier's throat. Before he could make so much as a sound, the blade viciously slashed it open with the resultant long gaping fissure like wound spraying blood profusely and with a fair quantity soaking the woman's face.

The soldier fell to the floor with blood pooling quickly around his head while the other soldier turned and saw only his fallen comrade and nothing else. Just as he turned back to interrogate the woman for all she was worth, she would see a hooded Pachirisu hopping onto the BlackWatch soldier's back and quickly with his paws, violently twisted the soldier's head to the right, causing the neck to snap effortlessly and so viciously that his neck itself split open. Blood gushed in vast amounts from the wound that splattered across the woman's face and dress even further.

As the soldier fell to his knees, the woman saw to her horror his head half hanging from the neck, his upper spine and flesh exposed within the wound from the violent way his neck was broken, while the hooded Pachirisu, The Prototype stepped out from behind his latest victim while clutching his chest in ongoing pain.  
>The woman, now free of her earlier binding, stepped back in fear before slipping overdramatically in the pool of blood on the ground, noticing her severed arm right next to her position before looking back at the male Pachirisu again.<br>"Stay back...just...just stay back." She pleaded in her clearly shaken state of mind as she backed up against the sandbags. Small comfort.  
>"I'm sorry I could not be your perfect invincible Superman...but I just saved your ass..." The Prototype replied sarcastically as he sat behind a solid concrete barrier to cover his position from potential enemy flanking. His chest in particular continued to throb painfully as he clutched its still bleeding bullet wounds with his paw.<br>"But they said they were helping me..." The woman began innocently, but in The Prototype's mind, obliviously as he looked her way sternly.  
>"No...BlackWatch help nobody. They preach to the choir in order to win false support...and have ruined the lives of many, mine included. You were lucky...they usually execute anyone with the slightest dose of the Blacklight Virus infection..." He explained in detail, but was then cut off by the sound of military chatter emitting from the voice communicator belonging to one of the deceased BlackWatch soldiers in front of him.<p>

"Are you there? Answer me! Don't give me the cold shoulder wet shit silent treatment, Connors! We have an operation to complete..." The voice proclaimed raucously, giving the male Pachirisu an inadvertant potential advantage. With the woman watching his movements carefully, The Prototype crawled over to the soldier's corpse and wrenched the voice communicator from the soldier's blood stained military uniform before replying on the soldier's 'behalf'.  
>"You know who this is. You sick motherfuckers get down here now...I will be waiting..." He demanded threateningly in a low tone of voice.<p>

Immediately and rather predictably, the reply was swift.  
>"Deus...we are coming for you...and when we do...we will hunt you down and hang you out to dry like a fucking Christmas tree..!"<br>The voice however did not belong to Commander Brett Cole, rather another mere foul mouthed grunt from somewhere within the BlackWatch ranks. The Prototype could only chuckle as he held the voice communicator to his mouth again.  
>"Then why don't you come here and prove it, asshole?" He retorted in a low, aggressive tone and tossed the voice communicator carelessly on top of the nearby soldier's corpse.<br>"What are you doing?" The woman inquired with a quixotic frown, just wondering why the male Pachirisu made such a decision.  
>"Time for you to get the fuck out of here unless you want your head blown off..." The Prototype retorted and demanded the woman leave the area.<p>

Unfortunately, just as the woman began her surge to vacate the premises, a BlackWatch sniper specialist appeared in a nearby, barely stable building. Taking aim from a bedroom balcony, the soldier trained the sniper rifle to his eye. In one catastrophic second, Deus looked up in horror as the woman stumbled and staggered. Her head above the mouth had been blown off as if it were nothing more than mere paper, with blood, bone, skin and flesh exploding into the air and littering the environment around her while the blood continued to spew amicably from the stump like an eruptive red fountain.  
>"Shit..." The Prototype sighed quietly in shame as the woman's body fell to the ground clumsily nearby. He then briefly poked his head around the barrier and the cover he sat against to notice a posse of gathered BlackWatch soldiers consisting of standard grunts wielding AK47s, SPAS 12s and the sniper who had already had some target practice was armed inevitably with a Dragunov sniper rifle. Predictably, one noticed his head emerging from cover and without hesitation began firing his AK47. The bullets thudded into the barrier and narrowly missed the male Pachirisu as the gunshots echoed around the vicinity.<br>"He's there! He's fucking there!" Screamed the BlackWatch soldier quickly as he alerted his comrades to the barrier The Prototype cowered behind by pointing.

"Fuck..." The Prototype cursed as he hid behind the temporary safety of the barrier, holding his head tightly in his paws as the rapid fire echoes of the AK47 assault rifles sounded throughout the vicinity.  
>"Tango's still behind the barrier. You...take him out!" One BlackWatch soldier commanded whom wielded a SPAS 12 shotgun. His comrade nodded obediently and signalled to the other two soldiers wielding identical shotguns to accompany him as back up. The pair nodded in response as they stood closely behind the commanding SPAS 12 wielding soldier in tandem.<p>

Approaching the barrier however, the lead soldier was taken by surprise and stabbed suddenly through the neck with a large blade. As blood sprayed about the area, the soldier was consumed into nothing but a mere component of DNA.  
>"Shit!" Another of the BlackWatch soldiers wielding a SPAS 12 called out in surprise. The Prototype stepped out from behind a barrier, rejuvenated while the BlackWatch soldiers prepared their guns as he rushed a SPAS 12 wielding soldier. Slashing suddenly and quickly with his blade arm, the soldier could do nothing as said blade sliced cleanly through his entire neck. He stood there for a moment in shock before his head slid away from his neck and fell to the ground in a bloody mess.<p>

As the neck stump of the soldier's body squirted blood into the air like a spectacular red, hissing fountain, the rest of the BlackWatch soldiers in the vicinity (besides the sniper specialist) moved in suddenly in an attempt to take The Prototype by surprise. The male Pachirisu however made note of their footsteps and waited keenly, patiently behind the road barrier once again and once a single soldier made himself close enough, he struck again, ruthlessly slicing through the soldier's lower stomach. As blood squirted and sprayed all over the place, the soldier's body bisected across the torso and fell into two horizontal pieces. The top half attempted to crawl away desperately, leaving a blood trail in his wake. The Prototype however was having none of it and using his blade arm, thrusted it downward and stabbed the soldier through the back of his head, with the tip of the blade emerging through his forehead and twisted it cruelly, ripping open the spurting wound even further.

The BlackWatch soldier died there and then as the blade tore away from his flesh and bone while leaving him face down on the ground without a sound. The Prototype then looked up again, past the barrier shielding him from the bullets fired by the still numerous remaining BlackWatch soldiers. Noting every one of them, he decided upon a more risky kamikaze style run like some sort of suicide bomber, sprinting through the hail of bullets to a single soldier, preparing his blade arm with a metallic 'twang' and then thrusted it forth, penetrating the soldier's flesh at chest level and embedding it deep within. As the soldier's blood spattered against him and his blackened coat, he would realise the blade had penetrated the soldier's heart and punctured it as further blood ran down the soldier's body and armour in gruesome droves. Tearing the blade arm away, the male Pachirisu watched the now deceased soldier's body slowly flop to the ground. He then looked up again at the remaining soldiers with a ruthless glint in his eyes.


	4. Ruination Part 3

**Ruination (Part 3):**  
>Training their eyes on him in return through the iron sights of their assault rifles with the seeming intention of blowing the male Pachirisu's head off, The Prototype's eyes clasped onto the sniper positioned high in the luxurious position of the nearby hotel balcony, the very same sniper who had already spilled innocent blood with remorseless, savage efficiency.<br>"Dalton to base camp…do you copy?" He inquired on his receiver as he watched over the proceedings below with the intention of updating the so called 'higher-ups' within the BlackWatch ranks.

A familiar voice picked up the transmission from the military's base camp presumably located within what was left of Goldenrod City somewhere.  
>"Solid copy, Dalton…what the fuck is going on?" The voice belonged to none other than Commander Brett Cole, his angered tone the result of the receiver picking up the sound of gunshots in the background.<br>"Fuck…! Codename Deus is active and attacking in our area…we need fucking back up now!" The sniper, Dalton, replied, causing a scowl to erupt from the other end just as The Prototype continued evading the tidal wave of quick fire bullets from the remaining BlackWatch soldiers in the area while effectively making use of his superior speed. With a simple flick of his already blood drenched blade arm, he slashed open the stomach of one soldier through his armour with ease, causing blood to audibly squirt in large amounts and the soldier's intestines to begin unraveling inside and then spilling onto the ground in a gruesome puddle of wet slop.

"Do you remember your rank among us, Dalton? No? Well I'll remind you, corporal cocksucker…I am your fucking commander! I tell you what to fucking do!" Cole stormed down the sniper's receiver, causing Dalton to frown considerably from behind his black mask that concealed his face.

At that moment, The Prototype had broken away from the group of soldiers and sprinted towards the unstable hotel at intense velocity with the soldiers continuing to fire their assault rifles haphazardly at him. He transitioned with ease onto the wall and began sprinting up its vertical surface, each step knocking fragments of it down towards the ground as bullets 'thunked' into it all around the male Pachirisu. Deus however paid little attention to the whizzing bullets as he made his way onto the roof directly above the sniper's position and took advantage of his prime position to listen in on Dalton's ongoing 'conversation' with Brett Cole.  
>"Alright then fuck you, Cole!" Dalton retorted in disgust but just as he did, he felt a pair of feet wrap around his neck. As he began to choke, his line of sight became obscured as the male Pachirisu's backside almost pressed up against the mask covering his face.<p>

"Dalton, tell me what the fuck is going on!" Cole screamed down the sniper's receiver as the choking could clearly be heard filtering through to the commander.  
>While dangling upside down as he choked and strangled the now groggy sniper (whom began to become pale), The Prototype snatched the receiver and pressed it to his mouth.<br>"You think you have me covered everywhere you go…but you don't. You are just another pawn to GENTEK's schemes…wasting your life devoted to hunting me down. You will always fail…you are just another insignificant cunt to me…except I will still kill you…"  
>He taunted and threw the receiver to the ground with a disgusted scowl being heard from the other end.<p>

With his own comments still fresh in his mind, the male Pachirisu somehow flipped himself forwards while his feet grasped Dalton's neck, causing the sniper himself to flip up and over the edge of the balcony. The Prototype finally let go of his grip as he completed a full front flip rotation and causing Dalton to freefall to the ground below.  
>He clung to the edge of the balcony with his paw as the sniper's screams of impending terror were silenced with a sickening thud and snap, the ground having finally broken Dalton's fall.<p>

Now though, The Prototype was at the mercy of the remaining BlackWatch forces in the area as he clung like a superhero to the edge of the balcony, or at least until he made the jump. He did so, landing on terra firma and causing a small section of the ground to fracture and kick up around him.  
>Unhurt, he checked his surroundings, making a note of the blood soaked, coiled pink loops on the floor nearby and remembered them belonging to one of the already deceased soldiers and the intestines that had spilled from him. Sighing, he then slowly rose to his feet and made his way over to the dying Dalton. Standing over him, The Prototype put him coldly out of his misery and plunged his blade arm through the sniper specialist's neck, causing blood to be choked up from his mouth and more to spurt from his neck. Twisting the blade arm sadistically, Dalton received a final surge of extreme pain before his life was sheered from him forever.<p>

Not content with the soldier's mere death, Deus ripped open the soldier's neck and, amid much squelching and flesh tearing, Dalton's throat emerged from the wound as gouts of stringy flesh stretched and, like said throat, tore away from his body covered in profusely dripping blood. Looking at the torn out throat on the end of his blade arm, The Prototype then cast it aside as it landed in the large puddle of blood around the now crimson covered corpse of the BlackWatch sniper.

"You bastard, Deus! You artificial freak! You just wait until we, BlackWatch, intercept your girl and make her scream...and bleed...right before those freaky eyes of yours...!" Screamed one of the remaining soldiers whom was clearly upset and distressed by Dalton's demise.  
>"Fuck you, dipshit..." Was The Prototype's simple, blunt response. As he prepared to take down the remaining soldiers in the vicinity, he noted a sudden rolling mist envelop him and the soldiers suddenly and quickly. Barely able to see through the thick fog, he began wandering aimlessly in the hope that he would pass through the end of the mist unscathed and regain a full view of his surroundings.<p>

The swirling, dense clouds of fog never seemed to end however and he was startled when he heard the anguished screams of a BlackWatch soldier begging for mercy. Those painful cries came to an abrupt stop when the sound of tearing flesh made itself known in profuse quantities.  
>"What the fuck is going on?" Another of the soldiers called out, clearly as befuddled and uneasy as The Prototype himself amidst the ever thickening fog.<p>

Using his ears, the male Pachirisu attempted to locate the other BlackWatch soldiers or even the potential perpetrator of the weird phenomenon. All he received was pure silence causing him to frown deeply.  
>Seeing very little and hearing nothing pushed anxious nerves to the forefront of even his mindset...and so he held his blade arm in front of him like a makeshift shield in case of an ambush.<p>

Ignoring the hard pressed fact that he had an armour form or indeed merely make use of his thermal vision (that of course tracked heat signatures), The Prototype pressed on with a hint of trepidation sinking in, still hearing very little as the fog only seemed to become even denser like he was trapped in a room with the walls closing in on him, perhaps heightening a sense of claustrophobia.

Then, a quiet sound of flesh continually scraping along the ground made itself known causing The Prototype to swivel around and glance towards the sound's general direction.  
>Narrowing his eyes, he surveyed the mist in great detail before through the swirling clouds, a severed head rolled across the ground in front of him, leaving a large and long red blood trail in its wake. It rolled into the fog upon the other side of The Prototype's peripheral vision, causing him to only frown further, deeply puzzled. He noted the head as still wearing the BlackWatch soldier grunt mask and denoted by now that only a single soldier remained in the general area.<p>

He could hear the soldier's every panicked breath, noting that his position was nearby somewhere.  
>"Leave me alone, motherfuckers!" The soldier screamed in hollow desperation, referring to The Prototype and also the culprit of the fog. At that moment, just as the soldier sounded like he was having a mental breakdown of immense proportions, the male Pachirisu caught sight of a small figure walking into the fog in the same direction he was travelling in. He denoted the figure as wearing a red hooded coat and had a long, squirrel like tail complete with three spike like protrusions just like Deus's own. The figure's tail looked eerily shadowed while set against the mist, as did the large weapon the figure was carrying, although blood could be seen dripping from its blade.<p>

Continuing onwards in the same direction, the piercing shrieks of the remaining BlackWatch soldier attacked the ear drums of anybody nearby, including those belonging to The Prototype.  
>Making his way towards the location the shrill sound came from, the male Pachirisu noted with surprise the silhouette of the BlackWatch soldier kneeling down as if he was either restrained or begging for his life.<p>

Approaching the soldier from behind, The Prototype heard the unusual sound of whimpering filtering through the grunt's mask, causing him to widen his eyes in surprise.  
>"You know you don't have to do this..." The soldier pleaded desperately with extended hand movements to emphasise his solemn words while Deus had neared. As he did, the sudden sight of a large, rustic and blood stained axe emerged suddenly from the mist and swung dangerously to the grunt's side.<br>It connected with brute force as the blade of the axe sunk deep into the side of the soldier's neck, causing an eruption of crimson blood to spurt and flow like a river down his armoured uniform. The soldier gagged his last breath painfully as blood also spilled from his mouth.

The axe was then withdrawn and disappeared as suddenly as it appeared, while the soldier's neck sprayed profuse amounts of blood that produced a clearly heard hissing like sound.  
>The Prototype was startled as the soldier's lifeless corpse fell to the ground with a bloody splash and decided against his better judgement to investigate the breaches of the ever thickening fog in front of him.<p>

As the swirls of the mist encircled his entire circumference like a pack of ravenous wolves, The Prototype's eyes narrowed in an attempt to pick out anything but fog and for a moment, nothing was out of the ordinary. Then out of nowhere, an odd voice could be heard prying...  
>"Weak, Mercer...weak..." It remarked, the voice male in tone and succeeded by mocking laughter. The male Pachirisu frowned again at the comment but proceeded forth in the direction the voice emitted from.<p>

After a moment, the silhouette of the figure that The Prototype glimpsed earlier emerged from the bowels of the fog. Standing still, the strange figure had its back turned in the male Pachirisu's direction, still chuckling and admiring the blood on its axe rather sadistically.  
>Its red hooded coat swayed in the breeze and its tail flickered unnervingly, while the pair of ears sticking up from the coat's hood flicked ever so slightly as if it knew The Prototype was around.<p>

The Blacklight infused Pachirisu closed in and stopped abruptly directly behind the figure, hesitating. Slowly and bravely, he moved forth his paw until it rested on the figure's shoulder.  
>The figure suddenly turned its head and stared coldly into The Prototype's widened eyes as he reacted in shock. Nothing but blackness could be spotted within the figure's hood except for a pair of large red glowing eyes, each like a perfectly rounded warning beacon.<p>

"What the fuck?" Uttered The Prototype with the utmost surprise painted upon his face. The figure continued to stare at him intimidatingly, even raising its axe in a threatening manner while the male Pachirisu only froze in the shock the entire scenario caused.  
>"Leave me alone if you know what's good for you..." The figure's odd voice chipped in, only serving to 'weird out' The Prototype even further. The figure then forcefully thrusted its paw forth, connecting with the male Pachirisu's chest with an intended malice. Deus was knocked back into the air for a few metres before landing awkwardly on his back.<p>

Grunting on impact, he sighed regretably as if in defeat while the figure disappeared once more into the fog, out of the male Pachirisu's line of sight. By the time he looked up again, the figure was gone, as was the fog. The intense wave of sight returned to him and an unusual feeling of paranoia washed over him like an unwelcome parasite. The intensity caused him to temporarily collapse to his paws and 'knees' shortly after scooping himself up again. Looking around him, the sight of destruction was obvious. A parked bus strewn across the road, sheered in half on its side while lampposts lay messily like sparkling matchsticks across the clearly buckled and lumpy tarmac. Blood had practically covered the ground in the vicinity, the vast majority of it fresh and moist while the trio of BlackWatch soldier corpses lay among the crimson liquid. Due to its thickness it could have been mistaken for a dyed lake with corpses floating on top.

The Prototype would notice one soldier's corpse had a slit so deep in the top of his head that it was almost bisected with blood and brain matter still oozing from the wound, while the other soldier he did not see being butchered was indeed decapitated as the severed head that The Prototype saw earlier would indicate a few metres away.

The third lay sprawled nearby, the deep fissure upon the side of his neck still spouting blood profusely while giving the impression that the head itself hung precariously from the neck, flesh and bone exposed clearly within the wound.

As the corpses lay to their inevitable rotting, the male Pachirisu heard the distinctive sound of Brett Cole's voice piping through the long dead sniper's receiver/voice communicator.  
>"Deus...Deus I know you can fucking hear me, you son of a bitch. When I find you, I will hit you so hard that you will ejaculate in excruciating excitement...and I would be more than happy to felch your arousal fluids and lick it clean for you again!" The commander's voice boomed and ended in a crude tone, perhaps indicating a taste in sadomasochistic sexual fantasies or even necrophilia.<p>

The Prototype then approached the receiver, still located near the balcony of the buckling hotel, his face showing signs of clear revulsion at his adversary's vile comments and decided to reply with one of his own.  
>"The only lubricant you will get a taste of will be my piss before I end your life..." He retorted in that equally crude and disturbing manner, causing even Cole to react in audible disgust.<br>"You have no fucking clue what I am capable of, you little shit...send in as many soldiers as possible. Codename Deus ends today in a motherfucking body bag!" The BlackWatch commander snarled before directing the various teams of soldiers towards The Prototype's position.  
>"If they find me first, you stupid fuck..." The Prototype muttered as he tossed the receiver away from him and towards the litter of already dead BlackWatch soldiers. Not wishing to join them in their untimely demise, he began wandering away calmly and collectively, ready to move away from his freshest victims with the primary aim now to find his loving mate, the female Pachirisu known to most as The Dark Clone...<p> 


	5. In the Absence of Light Part 1

**In The Absence of Light:**

A few hours had by now passed by in the shaken remains of Goldenrod City and darkness fell like a deep stranglehold over it all.

Inevitably the streets were barely illuminated due to the many fallen lampposts, some laying clumsily over crushed cars and others barely hanging on to their stationary anchors. The streets lay desolate and fractured with many roads and pathways contorted into hills or jagged ramps. Civilian corpses littered these streets either dismembered or with deeply pained facial expressions while finally, buildings tall or just housing lay in ruin amid a swarm of debris sharp or otherwise, many still with embers burning.

The hooded male Pachirisu made his way down one such street as the ambient sound of cold, radioactive influenced wind being all he could hear as everything around him lay silent.  
>Wandering past a large row of destroyed houses all missing large chunks of their structures, he sighed deeply as he took out a small photograph from his hooded coat. Peering at it as he held it in his paw, it depicted his beloved mate known as The Dark Clone, a female Pachirisu with short to fair length jet black hair, mismatched heterochromia eyes (red and green), black fur stripe and clad in body hugging black robes.<p>

The photo alone made Deus stop in his tracks momentarily while taking a deep breath.  
>"Sweetcheeks..." He muttered quietly in a solemn tone of voice and gently caressed the photo slowly with his other paw. The look in his eyes held a severe sense of concern as a series of 'what if' style questions swam around inside of his head.<p>

Stowing the photograph in his coat pocket again the male Pachirisu wandered on, noting the corpse of a muddied Quilava hanging precariously close to a deep crevice in the road, its trainer lying metres away on a car bonnet clutching an open Poké Ball, indicating that he was set to have the Quilava return. The scenario caused The Prototype to shake his head almost sympathetically as he wandered on past and eerily noticed the levelled remains of the red and white Pokémon Centre nearby, its entrance standing against an equally destroyed house precariously across the street.

Out of the corner of his eye, The Prototype noticed a small silhouette like figure silently make its way into the remains of the Pokémon Centre. All he could pick out was the long, squirrel like tail with three spike like protrusions, but curiosity had once again compelled him to investigate.

"Sweetcheeks? Is that you?" He called in hope but as he anticipated, no answer. He proceeded forth towards the remnants of the Pokémon Centre cautiously, his footsteps on the verge of silence as he passed the corpses of many more civilians, Pokémon trainers and Pokémon all over the road while many open and empty Poké Balls lay scattered amongst them as if they were simply discarded and left to rot.

Still taking pity upon them, The Prototype shook his head ever so often softly before reminding himself of his compelling curiosity. Approaching the shattered doorway of the Pokémon Centre, he froze in audible surprise as a small figure dashed from one side of the doorway to the other, leaving him partially startled.  
>"Who's there?" He called out as his voice was carried through the dilapidated lobby before looking back behind him to ensure he was not cheaply flanked. As he did, one of the fractured houses slowly fell forward and crumbled apart, the bricks, frame work and shattered glass kicked up a large cloud of dust as they crashed to the ground in a large pile of disorganised rubble.<p>

The resulting pile covered the corpses of a blood soaked Girafarig and its shoulder length brown haired female trainer. The latter had a jagged portion of framework slice through her left arm at the elbow, causing the bloodied chunk of arm to propel narrowly past The Prototype and thud with a disgusting squelch against the slanted wall of the Pokémon Centre, leaving a spatter of blood against it as the portion of the arm fell to the ground in front of the structure and Deus himself.

Once again, The Prototype could only shake his head at the events that transpired before he turned his head back to look forth again. As he did, his eyes widened considerably at the sight. Behind the bisected reception desk, a crimson spattered Nurse Joy stood behind, nailed to the wall with a pair of icky blood red tendril like tentacles, both of which had pierced through her eye sockets with blood dripping profusely from either one. The blood itself travelled down her body, completely stark naked with her modest sized breasts and pubic region clearly in view.

Beneath her inevitably was a large pool of blood with more travelling down the wall behind her, while bloody hand prints pockmarked the desk and walls elsewhere.  
>"Who the fuck would do such a thing?" The male Pachirisu muttered to himself in further revulsion, although as he would scan the room with his watchful eyes he would find that was not the last of it.<p>

Piled beside the other walls themselves were numerous webs of tendrils feeding from many stacks of sticky, ill smelling biomass all of which were crimson in colour and squelched periodically in a vile manner.

The Prototype covered his nose with his paw although something seemed familiar about the blood like biomass as well as the stench it gave off. Knowing this feeling of familiarity, he decided to give the substance a closer look, although since the whole interior of the Pokémon Centre seemed dark and foreboding, he spotted a flashlight on the blood smeared floor and scooped it up.

Flipping its switch, the beam slowly flickered on and gave off a narrow but bright cone of light that shone off anything the male Pachirisu deemed fit to point it at. As he did, he headed over towards one of the biomass piles and noted its quivering form as if somebody had vomited jelly with a host of other regurgitated contents.

Shaking his head as a sign of further revulsion, he looked away and quickly plunged one paw inside, causing it to squelch horribly. As he felt its flesh like jelly move against his paw, he removed it quickly and was finally able to deduce what exactly was able to create such foul monstrosities.  
>"Blacklight…strain A of DX11-18. Shit…" He remarked with a mumble, remembering that in the creation of the first form of Blacklight, aka DX11-18 strain A or more well known for being contagious and imperfect, but in one wielder as powerful as himself albeit with a more possessive quirk.<p>

However at that moment, he felt heavy breaths toying with the back of his neck like a breeze with respite. Widening his eyes in surprise as the feel of the breaths became wilder; he turned around quickly but saw nothing further out of the ordinary. He did however hear scampering footsteps skittering away from him, causing him to shine the cone of light from the flashlight through the doorway into the next room. That room sat behind the impaled and nude corpse of Nurse Joy in which he would have to pass by in order to reach said doorway.

"Sweetcheeks? Are you here?" He asked once again, but all he would receive would be utter silence. The male Pachirisu then passed Nurse Joy's corpse just as a large trickle of blood fell from her open mouth and narrowly missing him in the process as it thudded against the formerly blue, now smeared red, floor.

The Prototype looked up at her once more and shook his head again, before quickening his quiet footsteps into the next room. Once inside, he moved the flashlight around and caught sight of the ceiling light, shattered with sparks descending to the ground.

He then moved the light to the floor itself and made a note of the large spate of closed and opened Poké Balls strewn uncoordinated on the surface, with many more sitting atop the broken conveyor belt that swerved past his position and in a hole to the next room.  
>What he would see next though would cause him to widen his eyes even further, almost to freakish levels as he heard moist drops hitting the hard surface of the ground. He predicted correctly that this would not be water, but blood as he shone the light on the vast red puddle and then up above it to notice a long, surprisingly sturdy beam connected to opposite walls. Inevitably, the beam, made of reinforced steel, was stained with blood and, chained and bound by the wrists and shins to it were a pair of male humans, presumably both Pokémon trainers. Both had their genitalia forcibly removed, shown by their bloody crotch areas while along with that, they were both also fully naked and covered in blood that often dripped to the ground below. Both of them faced down as a result of their binding and both of their faces had been cut off, one displaying a mound of icky flesh and the other with his skull exposed.<p>

The Prototype pulled a face as if he wished to regurgitate in disgust at the sight and smell, but his thoughts were interrupted when a door on the other side of the room blew open like a hurricane force wind had arrived unceremoniously.

The male Pachirisu pointed the flashlight through the now open doorway, but stood back in horror as standing there in that doorway was a female Pachirisu staring back at him. She was not The Dark Clone however, told by her large blue eyes, short messy (and bloodstained) brown hair and a blood spattered black hooded jacket similar to his own, though the hood was not placed over her head. Her ears and stripe colouring was a light shaded mixture of brown and orange, almost cocoa and held similar patterns to The Prototype's own as well.

"Hera…" He gasped, remembering the one chance meeting they had not so long ago when The Prototype was on a mission to rescue The Dark Clone from the clutches of GENTEK and was unwittingly diverted down to the chamber that played residence to Project Hera whom he freed out of sympathy and what resulted in a brutal battle that neither won.

As he thought of that fateful day, how Hera escaped and how he eventually rescued The Dark Clone, the female Pachirisu bounded forwards without warning and, interrupting his thoughts, forcefully tackled him to the ground. Glaring down at him as she slowly sat up on his stomach, The Prototype caught a scent of blood and decay emanating from her.  
>"You remember me…" She remarked, her deep voice warped and echoed as her eyes widened in examining him.<p>

Restraining him in place she proceeded to lean forward slightly and seemingly began choking violently, followed quickly by uncontrollable coughing as her face moved to right above his own, glaring at him while the coughing continued.

He could feel her vibrating violently on top of him as she coughed in his face continuously to his increasing disgust. As the choking reached its peak however, she began coughing up a red, blood filled substance that exited her mouth and began dripping onto The Prototype's face. The substance smelled vile and looked even more disgusting and the male Pachirisu blinked in quick succession as more hit his face.

No longer wanting the bane of restraint, he pushed forwards, knocking her away onto the ground and allowed himself to stand up, wiping away the repulsive substance from his face on the sleeve of his coat.  
>"What is wrong with you?" The Prototype asked of Hera as she scooped herself onto her feet, wiping her mouth with her paw and glaring at him as he did likewise in return.<br>"I need blood. You are on the menu..." She replied in a disturbingly calm tone of voice before turning away, wandering back through the open doorway that The Prototype first found her with the intent of leading him inside.

The male Pachirisu followed and mutated his right arm into the large blade cautiously and as he moved through the doorway into the next darkened room, albeit with flashlight in paw again, he would receive a further shock.  
>A set of beams along the line of the ceiling ran along the length and width above the room held a cacophony of nude human corpses, both male and female, all chained up by their wrists. They had not had their genitalia removed as of yet and were set out in such a way that they were like the hedges of a macabre maze.<p>

"Fight me!" The quirky female Pachirisu demanded from somewhere among the corpses and darkness. Shining the beacon of light from the flashlight slowly around the room, he would notice the dried smears of blood that had recoloured its shade of pale blue into an entirely less tasteful yet regardless more vivid crimson.

The pungent stench of the rotting corpses unwelcomingly shot up his nose and gripped his sense of scent like an invisible burden. Holding his blade arm in front of him protectively, he continued shining his flashlight among the corpses. Breathing heavily, he then heard Hera's warped grunt, indicating she was nearing him and causing him to lash out in hope more than accuracy. Slicing off a hung corpse's legs at the knees and causing blood to pour from the stumps, he heard the female Pachirisu's laughter from behind him and her blade arm knocked away his flashlight before clashing with his own.

After the 'twang' like sound rang out, he swiped desperately again and missed by a long shot as the scampering footsteps of Hera moved away from him.  
>"Show yourself, you bitch!" He demanded, his voice echoing throughout the room as he made use of his thermal vision at last to track heat signatures.<p>

Looking around, all he could see was lukewarm red signatures given off by the corpses, indicating they were recently dispatched and hung to dry like freshly washed clothes. However as he looked around still, footsteps quickly grew louder and the sound of a blade swiping maliciously close by caused him much surprise. Bringing up his normal, unmutated arm and paw in front of him, he felt his arm, its flesh and its bone slipping away from him. With a large audible squelch he witnessed his arm slowly peel free from his body and drop to the ground in a mushy splash, causing his blood to squirt all over a nearby wall from the remaining stump.

Grunting, he slumped back against said wall for a moment as the blood continued oozing out of him with a sound not dissimilar to a running tap.  
>Gaining his breath back, he was then scooped up tightly around the neck in Hera's paw and slammed back into the wall.<br>"Now you are mine...my body shall feast upon yours..." She taunted him with a mind to absorbing him in sadistic relish. As tentacles began to sprout from her body ominously and with the male Pachirisu choking and gagging from being strangled, he swiped his blade arm viciously across her face.

As her blood splashed all over his face, coat and the wall behind him, he felt himself being dropped to his paws and 'knees'. Hera's blood continued to drip over him like dark red raindrops, deeply staining his coat in particular as she held her face and staggered back further.

As The Prototype looked up, he was just in time to witness the lower half of Hera's face slowly slip away from her and amidst more horrible squelching, the flesh to tore away and exposed her bloodied lower skull. Her lower face complete with her lips fell to the floor and spilled fresh crimson against it as the male Pachirisu watched wide eyed in disgust.

"You...you stupid cunt..." Hera muttered under her breath as she looked down upon the male Pachirisu while he slowly stood up again. Once on his feet, Hera thrashed her blade arm forwards dangerously at him, causing him to widen his eyes further and react quickly, slamming his own blade arm against her's to block her advances.

Accompanied again with the 'twang' like sound given off by the metallic clashing, the pair continued to bounce their blades off of the other's like a vicious sword fight.  
>Their blades clashed again, scraping along one another's as sparks tumbled from the sharp metallic edges. Hera then pulled back a few inches and swiped her blade in a horizontal motion in an effort to take off the male Pachirisu's head. The Prototype ducked just in time as the female's blade arm swept across the air above him. What resulted was a hanging corpse nearby to be sliced in half across the lower torso and the blood soaked intestines to unravel like tangled wires and dangle from the still hanging upper half.<p>

"Why am I such a treasured prize, you bitch?" The Prototype inquired forcefully of the female Pachirisu as he forged an assault of his own and thrusted his blade arm at her with potentially brutal force. With a scowl she refrained from answering as she swiftly blocked his advances with her own blade arm and then used it viciously to slice across The Prototype's face. He reeled back in shock as he would realise both sides of his mouth had been bloodily slit open, forming a grotesque 'chelsea smile'.

Immediately blood began to ooze out of the wound(s) and dripped profusely from his lower face. As he was about to fall to the floor in shock, Hera grasped him by the neck again with her paw and immediately plunged her blade arm deep into his stomach and out of his back, causing further blood to spurt from both the entry and exit wounds.

As he coughed more up his eyes became groggy, followed closely by his battered body. He swiped once more with his blade arm while she was off guard, slicing open Hera's chest partially but deeply, allowing part of her spinal cord, some ribs and inner flesh to be seen.  
>"Why...why are you not submitting to my demands?" Hera cried out in seeming anguish as her normal paw and arm covered her wounded chest to try and stop the blood from pouring, succeeding only partially.<p>

"I'm not your fucking nourishment and I never was!" The Prototype sneered aggressively in response. He then tossed Hera away from him, causing her to clatter against dangling corpses and making them swing on the spot vigorously before a solid wall stood in her way. She slammed into it with brute force, causing her to groan in pain and slump to the ground. Inevitably she was now on the other side of the room, causing the male Pachirisu great problems locating her whether he made use of thermal vision or not. This again was down to the relatively recently dispatched corpses and their own still warm heat signatures. He did the only thing he could and looked around frantically. He knew he, like Hera was rapidly losing blood through his wounds and that merely standing up would be made more and more difficult to accomplish.

"You are nothing!" Hera screamed as a number of the dangling human corpses shook seemingly by themselves. The male Pachirisu shook his head and staggered forwards in search of the odd female Pachirisu but as he did, he lost his balance and collapsed awkwardly on his side. He knew now that if the other Pachirisu was still standing, he was fighting a losing battle.

So...he began crawling on his front towards the only door that lead in and out of the room and leaving wet smears of red blood trailing in his wake. His breaths were heavy and desperate all of a sudden and his actions had by now alerted Hera to his struggling position.

Forbodingly, he heard the sound of plodding footsteps that quickly became louder and louder and he knew that she must be getting closer and closer. He began attempting to slither along the ground at a greater pace as he became increasingly more desperate in his bid for freedom.

However in one single harrowing moment as he neared the door, he heard the sound of a blade and his back received an immediate, almighty pain. Hera's blade arm had penetrated his back so deeply that it emerged from his stomach. His blood spattered across the floor beneath him and as the female Pachirisu retracted her blade arm, he collapsed pathetically on his front.

Immediately a growing pool of blood formed beneath him as a result of his wounds while Hera stood over him menacingly. As she did, she rolled him onto his back so he could see his slayer before he perished.  
>"It's time to die..." She muttered menacingly as she more or less collapsed on top of him and allowed her blood to drip and leak onto his face and chest specifically from the locations of her own wounds. Restraining him, blackened tentacles emerged from her body and began to stab into his sides, causing him great discomfort in the process.<p>

It was not just the burden of physical pain haunting him however, but also that of a more mental note. His eyes became moist and their bases filled quickly with tears. Speaking up quietly, the tone of voice hinted at regret and sadness.  
>"I...I love you, sweetcheeks..." He muttered as another of Hera's tentacles latched onto his frontal body.<p>

However what he heard next he never expected as a familiar female voice seemingly replied to him and for a moment he thought the voice was inside his mind.  
>"I love you as well, my dear..." The more familiar voice beckoned in response. As tears streamed down The Prototype's face in hasty sadness, he gasped as Hera began to cry out in sudden, incredible pain.<p>

Her arm's bones began to snap one by one drowning out all but the moans of pain, before Hera's squelching flesh simmered inwards as the bones that had earlier broken violently penetrated through the softer tissue and skin. Hera reeled back, blood audibly squirting from the ever worsening wound and leaving a long crimson streak down the male Pachirisu's face and his coat covered chest and stomach.

As she reeled back, an odd but razor sharp destructive disc sawed off the feet of two hanging corpses before heading straight for Hera. Her tentacles had by now retracted into her body but she was too late to stop the odd disc from slicing straight through her stomach.

She wheezed oddly as she coughed up a large amount of blood and a large red line began to seep through her already bloodied fur and coat.  
>The Prototype looked up just in time with a cough to notice Hera's upper half slide away from her lower half and fall to the floor, exposing her flesh within.<p>

Devastatingly weakened she could barely even muster the energy to do so much as move, while her attacker finally stepped forward into The Prototype's line of sight and to his great relief and joy as she revealed herself as none other than The Dark Clone...


	6. In the Absence of Light Part 2

**In the Absence of Light (Part 2)**

"Sweetcheeks..." He muttered gratefully as tears aligned his eyes that looked her way.

"I'm so glad I found you." The Dark Clone replied as she slowly knelt down beside her injured lover. Tears resided also at the bases of her eyes as they stared lovingly at one another, glad to finally be in the other's company again..

The Dark Clone herself had a number of cuts pockmarking her pretty face and may have had more on her body that was hidden mostly beneath her blackened robes, themselves complete with crimson and white Akatsuki symbols. The long bangs of her jet black hair dangled downwards towards The Prototype's face in particular as her mismatched red and green eyes continued to look at him.

Unsurprisingly he looked her back as their bloodstained paws grabbed and held one another's. They clamped tightly like vices albeit infinitely more welcoming and neither grimaced or complained, but one finally did break the otherwise solemn silence.

"I'm sorry..." The Prototype muttered as he began snivelling a little, but was quickly hushed by his mate.

"You have nothing to be sorry about, Deus." The Dark Clone reassured him as she brushed her tears away on the sleeve of her robes. The hurt and damage on the male Pachirisu's body had clearly taken a toll on her emotions as her other paw began gently caressing his face.

"I was trying to find you...ever since we were split from one another." The Prototype wheezed as tears rolled from his eyes, his own paw moving against his cheek softly and his eyes themselves examined the numerous cuts upon her face.

"I was so worried about you, Deusy..." She responded quirtly as her paw met his face again and brushed across his cheek calmly and in a loving manner. The Prototype purred quietly and slowly sat himself up to allow himself a more leveled out view of his mate. Strands of blood however dripped from his mouth and the deep slits to both of his mouth's sides. Grimacing weakly from his injuries, his eyes held burning love within them as he looked into The Dark Clone's own; something he often did.

Just as they attempted to speak again a surge of blood escaped his throat and out of his mouth. Coughing it all up violently, he wheezed as the sound of the blood spattering across the hard surface of the floor in front of him disconcerted his mindset.

"Are you sure you're OK?" The Dark Clone asked in sheer concern and patted his back with her paw to ensure he would no longer need to spew more.

"I...have to be. It...it hurts so bad..." The male Pachirisu replied and admitted that he felt his body's physical pain felt unbearable. His reflection could be seen in the resulting puddle of blood, allowing him to see to his horror the chelsea smile he had been given.

"Sweetcheeks lets get you out of here." The Dark Clone declared as she helped her groggy mate slowly onto his feet and kept her arm around him to support his weight.

"Th...thank you." The Prototype muttered in gratitude and became disconcerted by the sound of his jaw squelching every time he spoke. The female Pachirisu nodded as if to accept his gratitude while looking at him. Through slow footsteps she began guiding him out of the room at last as well as towards the entrance of the desecrated Pokémon Centre. This involved retreading earlier steps and past the many mutilated corpses scattered (or more appropriately, hung) throughout the building.

As they reached the entrance, The Dark Clone spotted a shabby looking white pickup truck heading towards them on the corpse and debris strewn street below and immediately thought of acquiring its driver's help.

"Stay here, sweetness." The female Pachirisu urged the male Pachirisu and sat him down carefully on the top of the entrance steps before she dashed out onto the road and waved her paws erratically to get the pickup driver to stop.

He spotted her and came to a halt with the result of squawking brakes. Luckily he was on his own and that there was conveniently two further spare seats for passengers.

He stepped out, a human male wearing a dark blue baseball cap, black hooded sweater and blue traditional jeans over white laced trainer shoes. His brown eyes fixated on The Dark Clone standing before him, or quite below his six foot tall build. He expected her to speak, which she promptly proceeded to do so.

"Excuse me, sir. My boyfriend is injured and needs help." She began with tears in her eyes and pointed towards the sitting, hooded male Pachirisu on the Pokémon Centre entrance steps.

The man's eyes had risen curiously as they were diverted towards the male Pachirisu in his injured state, causing his deep voice to be heard for the first time.

"How is he still even alive let alone sitting up?" He asked, his voice giving off a gravelly quality even in surprise.

"I think it would be best if he told you himself." The female Pachirisu replied in haste as she signaled The Prototype to join her. Groggily, he stood up and nodded before slowly taking the steps one at a time. This caused The Dark Clone to race over and place her arm around his back in order to avoid him further injuring himself by falling again.

"Is he trustworthy?" Deus asked calmly, although by the sound of his voice it implied he was gurgling on blood in his throat.

The female Pachirisu looked at him.

"Well we don't have a lot of options otherwise." She responded and he knew she was right.

"OK...I trust that." The male Pachirisu agreed as he was helped to stand in front of the truck driver who examined his wounds in detail.

"My god...how is it possible to survive this much blood loss?" The man almost repeated himself word for word as The Prototype hesitated.

"Tell him, sweetcheeks." The Dark Clone urged him quietly, causing him to nod as if obediently.

"OK...I am still alive and mobile because...I am the host of the perfected Project Blacklight...and I...deeply oppose GENTEK and...and Blackwatch." Deus explained briefly as he faced the human before him. The man raised his eyes.

"Blackwatch, you say? I fucking detest them." He replied rather bitterly, causing The Prototype's eyes to widen in return.

"Why? What did they do to you?" The male Pachirisu asked weakly, puzzled and curious. The man adjusted his baseball cap on his head as thoughts he had locked away were allowed to oppress themselves again...

"OK I'll tell you...since we both seem to share the same goal..." The man began with a second deep and heavy sigh.

"I'm sorry, buddy...we've both been wronged by these motherfuckers...I just want to know how they wronged you." The Prototype muttered, hoping for it to be at least of some comfort. The man nodded in gratitude before deciding to begin.

"OK here goes nothing. I had a wife and two daughters, all so beautiful and full of joy and life. We always travelled here to Goldenrod City on our vacations. We loved the golden sandy beaches, the National Park, the hustle and bustle...scenery...you name it. My life was great, working for Professor Elm back in my hometown of New Bark. I was his assistant and helped to run many experiments for him, all regarding the assistance of many different Pokémon species. It was great...we helped save Pokémon, boost their morale in the wild...you know.  
>Anyway me and my family came here a week ago on our twice yearly holiday. We were staying at the beachside, exclusive Royal Ocean Resort. It was wonderful as always. We spent a lot of time at its water park, Ocean Springs. My daughters, Dana and Rosie loved the slides and the warm, crystal clear natural swimming pools. My wife, Sophia and I, loved the relaxation and downtime, watching our daughters, reading and canoodling with one another. It was perfect...or at least as close to perfect as one could get.<p>

At night we got together as a family for dinner and watched movies like Wall-E. Things just couldn't be better. Of course four days later...today, the earthquake struck. It was terrifying. We were in our room watching TV and then this violent fucking shaking occurred. The walls began to crumble, the windows shatter. We could hear people shrieking and dying all around, above and below us. We were lucky, although a severed arm fell into our room...a young woman's arm. The sight of the blood it left around it terrified Rosie and despite our calls for her to stop she ran into the corridor. She never stood a chance.  
>Assault Rifle fire deafened us for no more than a few seconds before it stopped again...but the damage had been done. Despite all the fucking shaking and devastation, nothing compared with the shock of what we saw next.<br>Rosie, clutched upside down like a ragdoll in the hand of a Blackwatch grunt. Blood drenched her pretty white dress from the bullet wounds in her body while more trickled over her face as it dripped from her mouth.  
>Sophia screamed and despite my pleas she rushed the grunts. The glowing blue eye areas of their hooded masks appeared intimidating, although my wife knocked one down successfully. However it did not help. The other grunt dropped our dead Rosie carelessly on her head and yanked Sophia back. I remember him calling her a filthy cunt and that she would be made their bitch. She screamed to no avail as the soldiers dropped their guns. I could do nothing, for Dana held me tight in terror for good reason.<p>

One of them sodomised Sophia with a knife and they took turns in violently raping her, before finally slitting her throat and leaving her blood to drain onto the floor.  
>Tears swept my eyes and Dana screamed for her mother. The soldiers told her to shut the fuck up and one fired their side arm. As the crack of the gunshot bellowed, the bullet passed through Dana's head and out of her forehead. Her blood hit my face heavily and her body went limp in my arms. I was shaking fearfully.<br>Blackwatch destroyed my loving family there and then like they were fodder for their wretched fucking kind. However the fuckers began arguing amongst one another over itchy trigger fingers and seemed to forget about me. I gently laid Dana's corpse on the ground and silently pressed forth. They were so deep in their bickering that I doubt if I had ran that they would've noticed.  
>I scooped up one of their Assault Rifles that they had carelessly discarded and pointed it at them both. My hands were shaking. I had never held a gun in my entire life and there I was, holding the Blackwatch motherfuckers' lives in my hands. I wanted the fuckers to die and rot in hell where they fucking belong.<br>They noticed me just too late though, those glowing blue goggles staring my way for no more than a split second as I cried bloody murder and opened fire on them. They never stood a fucking chance.

The bullets tore holes in their torsos and their blood constantly sprayed onto the wall behind them. Their bodies spasmed and twitched with the force of every bullet and keeled over dead. I had killed fellow humans...and yet I felt no remorse, for those soldiers were nothing but fucking monsters.  
>I suddenly felt like I could make a difference in an entirely new way in honour of my family. I took every firearm and bullet they had on them. I knew their presence wasn't a welcome one after that and I decided I should band together the Blackwatch Resistance Group..." The man explained in depth and detail, although in the end was interrupted by an intrigued Deus...<p>

"I'm terribly sorry to hear about your family, man. That just proves what fucking dogs they are...but a resistance group? I honestly thought my girlfriend and I were all alone." The Prototype remarked sympathetically and could tell the man before him looked genuinely upset over the vile loss of his family.

"Thank you. It's been hard to cope since them. I must be strong for the Resistance however...one that could be in your debt if you assisted us." The human male proposed as he looked at both The Prototype and The Dark Clone rather seriously. It caused the pair of Pachirisu to look at one another. Nodding in unison the male Pachirisu looked back at the truck driver and so called Resistance leader.

"Sure...as capable as we are...we could use some allies in this shithole." He approved the man's invitation, causing the human to smile unavoidably.

"That's the best news I've had all fucking day. I'm Trevor by the way...Trevor Cartwright." The truck driver finally said, revealing his name at last. He stared on at the two Pachirisu as if to expect them to return the favour.

The Prototype complied...of sorts.

"Call me Deus...and my girlfriend is The Dark Clone."

Trevor nodded as he adjusted the baseball cap on his head slightly, before The Dark Clone spoke up.

"Shall we get away from this area now?"

The Prototype and Trevor nodded in unison and the latter stepped back into his truck again before shutting the driver's side door. He then beckoned the Pachirisu couple to his truck. They nodded and sighed in grateful relief.

Wandering forth together, the female Pachirisu wrapped her arm around her lover and helped him keep his balance along the way. After a couple of minutes, The Dark Clone into hopping in the truck. He sat in the seat beside Cartwright. He then watched as his mate clambered into the other passenger seat after closing the door.

"We're ready." The Prototype uttered calmly as he looked at the stump that was once his left arm and the blood soaked bone that protruded through the flesh.

As Trevor began driving forth along the buckled stretch of road, he swerved every so often to avoid the wrecks of vehicles, lampposts or other obstacles such as corpses or holes in the tarmac itself. The Dark Clone looked at the male Pachirisu with concern, particularly at his grisly images.

"Are you sure you're OK, sweetness?" She asked of him as her eyes became moist with tears.

"I...I have to be. I would never leave you behind. We've not yet been married or had children." The male Pachirisu replied. His words stirred The Dark Clone somewhat. She grabbed his head and kissed his temple soothingly and lovingly. As she did, his eyes filled with tears as well. He was so glad to be able to share her company once again.

Cartwright could not share a horrendous flashback from his mind as he continued driving through the chaos ravaged road. It was otherwise practically devoid of life.

"My family meant the world to me, you know? They gave me courage and strength. Now their deaths have forced me to want nothing but revenge. It will haunt me; scar me so much more than any bullet wound could. It's fucked up my psyche seeing Sophia have that combat knife shoved up her ass and twisted. Her cries of pain and the soldiers violently raping her as she bled helplessly. My daughters too were made into nothing but fucking ragdolls." The human heavily contemplated on the guilt and loss of his beloved family in mounds. The Prototype was just about able to console him again when he began coughing violently. The female Pachirisu's eyes widened in more concern as her paw patted his back.

"Is he OK?" Trevor inquired in his own form of concern. The male Pachirisu continued to splutter relentlessly.

"I hope so." The Dark Clone replied as her eyes never left The Prototype. As it was going on however the male Pachirisu rocked back and then forth again. Finally, he hurled a projectile of blood from his mouth that splattered all over the floor mat for his seat beneath the dashboard. His body went onto spasm for a second and then he hit his head on the back of his seat again. He sat back, blood still dripping from his mouth.

"I'm so sorry!" The female Pachirisu suddenly exclaimed apologetically from the resulting mess on her lover's behalf. Trevor merely gestured with his hand not to worry. He himself was more concerned about The Prototype's wellbeing.

"It's fine...absolutely fine. The truck could do with a good clean anyway." Cartwright mumbled as he concentrated on the road and any strewn debris ahead.

Finally the male Pachirisu's brush with pain subsided for now just as Blackwatch soldiers could be spotted on a ridge up ahead, along with something else entirely.

"You two should hold onto something. Things are going to get messy." Trevor remarked. On the road in front of them was a sea of human shapes shambling about nonchalantly among the burning wrecks of cars and buses. However whilst they were very clearly , the non descript, guttural moans alone were enough to inform one of just what they had become.

"We've got zombies!" Cartwright exclaimed, confirming the Pachirisu pair's suspicions. The infected lurched around randomly. The majority had blood dripping from their mouths against their heavily tattered and bloodstained attire. They seemed to be largely ignorant of the 'meat' on offer inside the oncoming truck. Only a few of them had noticed the Blackwatch soldiers along the ridge, raised as a result of the earthquake alongside the road.

Predictably, the Blackwatch soldiers began firing their assault rifles and the sound of gunfire reverberated around the area. Even more expectantly, the black hooded and armoured, blue goggled soldiers seemed to take absolutely no interest whatsoever if there was any uninfected survivors among the mass of zombies. They had not yet taken into account the presence of Trevor Cartwright's occupied truck.

Inevitably, an assortment of infected had began to be riddled with bullets. Each of them had bullet wounds that tore open on their bodies and each wound squirted a profuse amount of blood. One not far in front of the now slow moving truck had a bullet rip into his head. It tore open a large, jagged and bloody circular hole in the back of his head. The result was a large blood spurt that splashed onto the windscreen and bonnet of the truck.

His torso was hit hard with further bullets, ripping open more circular holes that spurted blood through his tattered clothing. At last, he clumsily fell sideward on the road. Cartwright was concerned enough to exclaim a suggestion or more so, an instruction to the Pachirisu pair.

"Get the assault rifle from behind the seats and shoot every motherfucker you see!"

The Prototype raised his eyes and slowly turned around. His paw on his only available arm met something long and hard behind the seat. It was a state of the art assault rifle alright. Complete with iron sight, fully loaded magazine and all. The sleek black firearm was probably stolen from Blackwatch themselves and the male Pachirisu examined its appearance briefly. The stump of his left arm smeared blood against his seat's headrest as he picked up the fairly bulky gun with his one remaining arm slowly.

Wheezing for a second, he then lurched forwards and stepped over The Dark Clone. He hung the end of the assault rifle out of the passenger side window.

"Are there any further cartridges for this gun?" The Prototype asked of Cartwright quickly.

"Yes there is. Just look under the fucking seats!" Trevor exclaimed with a nod of the head and continued weaving in and out of desolate vehicles with his truck.

Bullets fired from the laser sight equipped assault rifles belonging to the Blackwatch soldiers positioned on the ridge. They sprayed the area heavily and many of the bullets tore through the zombies massing on the road. Their torsos and heads ruptured open with jagged circular wounds from which heavy amounts of blood spurted from. The thuds of the impacts upon the bodies were clearly heard in amongst further flurries of assault rifle fire.

The Prototype had readied his assault rifle out from the passenger side window of the truck. His bloodstained backside stooped near to The Dark Clone's face due to his position, causing her to blush as he screamed at the enemy soldiers.

"Take this, you sick cunts!"

His sudden proclamation earned the attention of the Blackwatch soldiers. They proceeded to gaze his way, but he squeezed the trigger for the first time and opened fire. In doing so, the sounds of bullets 'thunking' into the soldiers, sprays of blood and filtered screams of agony through their masks could all be heard successively.

"It's the fucking freak!" One unaffected Blackwatch soldier yelled in the direction of other comrades and pointed towards the mobile truck in the near distance.

"You and you I want you both to take the fuckers out!" Another arriving soldier ordered demandingly to a further two. Those two climbed up onto the ridge with a rocket launcher each. Immediately they trained the scopes of their weapons on the fast moving truck with excellent eye co-ordination.

"Holy fuck...Cartwright they have RPGs trained on us!" The Prototype warned his and The Dark Clone's new found ally. Trevor nodded with a tut and pressed the accelerator pedal into the floor. Whatever oomph the truck had kicked in just as the Blackwatch soldiers simultaneously fired a pair of rockets upon them.

The rockets bore down on them quickly and menacingly, but Trevor thought fast and steered his truck behind a slew of abandoned cars. This caused the rockets to impact with said cars, detonating immediately and causing a large scale explosion. As a gigantic fireball ripped into the air, vehicles were sent flying and barrel rolled through the air before causing more explosions as they hit the ground again. It was as if an entire field of mines had been set off.

The Prototype fell back and hit his head on the side of his designated seat, causing him to grunt. The Dark Clone fell beside him on her front, making her grumble as Trevor continued driving and accelerating.

"Fuck me..." Groaned the female Pachirisu as the male Pachirisu stirred and quipped.

"I'd love to, my dear but now is not the time."

The female chuckled at his comment and hauled herself up, helping her lover back up as well. As she did, The Prototype took off the current, depleted ammo magazine on the assault rifle and replaced it with another. Then, he returned to his position at the passenger side window. With his remaining right arm, he rested the firearm against the ledge of the window and opened fire rapidly again, primarily at the rocket launcher wielding Blackwatch soldiers.

The bullets sprayed intensely and did not appear to do a whole lot. That was until one found its target, ripping through one soldier's head before another rocket could be fired. Blood spurted out of the entry wound rather dramatically and then tore through the other side of the soldier's face on its way out. As it did, that side of his face exploded dramatically. It shredded off that side of his mask as blood poured, flesh dripped and splattered across the ground beside him. Skin and flesh dangled precariously and flapped off of his face like a tattered flag. He finally fell lifelessly to the ground with blood still squirting into the air.

"Fuck!" Cried out his comrade in disgust as he composed his positioning and watched the truck with an eagle eyed concentration. The truck sped behind abandoned vehicles among a sea of ravenous zombies. With that in mind he watched through the scope of his rocket launcher carefully, waiting for the perfect moment to fire.

The truck veered to the left to avoid more abandoned vehicles, continually running down masses of zombies in its path. One had her head crushed flat by the tyres while another's intestines spilled against the bonnet, their abdomen sheared open as a result of blunt force trauma. The Prototype continued firing the assault rifle he clutched relentlessly at the Blackwatch soldier on the ridge. The soldier chose to fire the rocket launcher he wielded.

The fired rocket bore down on the exposed truck with incredible pace. As this happened, the culprit Blackwatch soldier had two bullets tear through his crotch and out of his backside. It caused him to scream wildly in pain as blood squirted audibly from the gaping wounds.

While he fell down from his crippling injuries, alive but in pain the rocket exploded in front of the truck. Once again it caused abandoned vehicles to flay and barrel roll through the air, doors and wheels flying off in all directions.

One door sliced through the truck's roof like a razorblade, narrowly missing Cartwright's head as he ducked. The roof sheared off in the blow, leaving the truck to look like a strange convertible style vehicle.

By now as the flailing cars exploded further behind them, The Prototype focused firing on the sea of zombies on the road. It was like looking out on an endless display of groaning, shambling corpses. Predictably the majority of the bullets fired tore in and out of the infected masses amidst outbursts of squirting blood from fresh, grisly holes in their heads, chests and abdomens.

However just as the male Pachirisu began to increase the accuracy of his held assault rifle, the dreadful click of a spent ammo cartridge made itself known. Inevitably no more magazines could be spotted and in frustration he slammed the gun on the floor of the truck.

"I've not had a good fucking day today." He growled in complaint as Cartwright and The Dark Clone both looked at him. He then sat back down in his seat and watched the truck's bonnet emitting thick black smoke that obscured the vision of the three severely.

"Fuck...truck's on its way out!" Cartwright cursed in anguish as his rustic truck caught fire and slowed to a standstill painfully quickly...


	7. In the Absence of Light Part 3

**In the Absence of Light (Part 3)**

Fortunately there was not so much as a group of zombies before them instead of the lake of dead bodies left in their wake. Even more fortuitously was the collection of dead Blackwatch soldiers strewn lifelessly in large pools of blood. They were mutilated in various forms with their still fully loaded guns lying beside them.

"Holy fuck more guns. This is what we fucking need!" Cartwright exclaimed in delight as he scooped up the assault rifles and shotguns. He also rifled through the Blackwatch corpses for extra ammunition. He was mostly successful.

After looting he proceeded to holster the shotgun on his back and loaded a new magazine readily into the assault rifle. After it clicked into place he stowed as much extra ammunition for both firearms in his pockets as he could carry.

Looking up he gasped in shock as The Prototype punched his paw all the way through a zombie's abdomen and out of the male shambler's back. Blood spurted out of the wounds as tendril like tentacles emerged from the male Pachirisu and ensnared the zombie. They ripped into him and tearing his body into small fleshy chunks. The chunks were then transported into his body and mulched into nothing more than Deus' DNA. Blood sprayed and gushed throughout the procedure, all of which painted the uneven and debris strewn tarmac. Somehow none of it stained the male Pachirisu or his coat.

Regardless, consuming the DNA of another like a flesh and bone filled health pack regenerated and rejuvenated him somewhat. Falling to one knee while grimacing, he noticed a new arm growing out of his previous one's remaining stump. Firstly skeletal in appearance, flesh and muscle soon grew and wrapped around the bones. They dripped copious amounts of blood and pus. Bloody phlegm spilled from his mouth as he endured the pain of regeneration, with skin and fur finally wrapping over the flesh and bone of his reconstructed arm. It was soon covered by the sleeve of his hooded coat.

With two arms and a fresh burst of energy again, The Prototype stood up slowly and quickly mutated his right arm through biomass. It became his favoured large hunting knife looking blade arm which glowed red on and off.

"Let's take out these motherfuckers." He hissed to the agreement of The Dark Clone and Cartwright whom both nodded with enthusiasm. The latter proceeded to open fire with the assault rifle he clutched. The resulting bullets peppered the body of one shambling zombie, spurting blood from every head and torso wound. While the bullets continued to puncture the now lifeless and sprawled zombie's body, The Dark Clone began to form an unusual and very destructive disc of energy. Known by herself as the Portal Disc, it hovered in midair as if waiting for a command. Then without warning it charged down a pair of shambling infected, giving them no chance to evade. The Portal Disc sliced through their necks one after the other, causing their freshly severed heads to roll across the floor and leave wet crimson trails in their wake. The headless corpses slumped to their knees profusely squirting blood from their fleshy neck stumps and flopped pathetically to the floor. The disc of energy cut straight through the middle of an abandoned vehicle, bisecting it vertically before it arrowed towards its next target. It spun rapidly upright like a wheel of razor blades and tore up the tarmac of the road it skimmed against.

The Prototype meanwhile dealt with another zombie, jumping up and viciously slicing open her back from neck to pelvis. It caused the zombie's intestines to spill onto the floor before the male Pachirisu grabbed onto, wrenched and tore out the entire bloody spinal cord with a crack and a squelch. The sound of it made Cartwright grimace.

"Tell me not to mess with you in future." He quipped as the zombie's spineless body fell unsupported onto her frontal body. She dragged her own entrails while her blood erupted like a red volcano from her back, accompanied by moist hissing like sounds, as she finally slumped dead.

The Prototype tossed away the blood soaked spinal cord from his equally bloody paw in order to face further infected former humans. Poising and threateningly scratching a semi circular mark upon the ground, The Dark Clone's Portal Disc arced upwards. At a diagonal slant, it sliced clean through the middle of a female zombie's head at an awkward angle. The zombie gurgled and spat profuse quantities of blood. A red moist red line appeared across her face at a forty five degree angle. Blood began to spray from the wound and with a squelch; the top half of her head slid away from the lower half and hit the floor. The remaining stump squirted blood into the air like the lava of a Hawaiian volcano.

She fell clumsily to the floor without movement in a bloody mess with the Portal Disc tearing up the road once again. While chunks of tarmac would be unceremoniously ripped through the air, the steel bullets fired from Cartwright's assault rifle punctured another zombie's head. It became riddled with gruesome bullet holes through which blood squirted from and left only a single infected standing. He would be slaughtered too. That was certain.

The Prototype took it on himself to put him out of his misery, sharpening his blade arm on the ash and blood stained tarmac. Then he made his dash towards the middle aged male zombie with the tattered traffic warden attire.

As he did, he made a typical transition through the air with a well timed leap. The zombie could do nothing as The Prototype twisted, leaped over him without warning and had his blade arm swipe viciously downwards. It sliced clean through the zombie straight down the middle of his body. The infected human coughed up copious amounts of blood before more began to spray in arterial spurts. The zombie's body finally peeled and separated through the centre with his entrails falling upon the floor in coiled pink loops and a pool of blood. He finally split in two, the pair of halves landing on the ground nearby to one another and the intestines, leaving the macabre mound slap bang between the two.

"Right they're fucking done." The Prototype grunted hoarsely without humorous consent. He swished his bloodstained blade arm threateningly before it mutated back into his normal arm once again.

"Time to head back to the shack I think." Cartwright uttered quietly before dead silence could set in. The Pachirisu pair nodded quickly while they stood side by side.

"Lead the way." The male Pachirisu remarked without urgency, his voice deep and low while his eyes pierced Trevor. The human agreed with a nod as The Dark Clone's Portal Disc dove and impaled a lifeless zombie's crotch with a squelch, causing more blood to splatter as it finally faded and vanished.

The Dark Clone then knocked into The Prototype's side with her own. She took his paw in her own too while eyeing him warmly as he did so in return. Their clothing brushed closely with one another and their smiles felt as warm as their looks.

Trevor led the way, pointing the assault rifle in front of him as he looked through its iron sight. He was looking to and fro like a professional military soldier, feet shuffling stubbornly and preparing to dart around every corner as if his life depended on it. It probably did.

"Come on, you two lovebirds hurry up. You can get it on back at the shack so long as you don't cum on the bed-sheets." He goaded the Pachirisu impatiently, albeit teasing them on their love for one another.

The male and female Pachirisu glared, albeit jokingly at Cartwright and paced themselves a little more, still paw in paw.

The human took cover and quickly swung around it with the assault rifle primed and ready. Nobody was there, the street ahead only littered with more damaged vehicles, debris from fallen buildings, and buckled lampposts. The tarmac of the road itself was cracked and even uplifted in places with cars teetering upon their edges, groaning as if in pain as they did so.

Cartwright continued leading the way, still pointing the assault rifle in every direction he faced. The Prototype and The Dark Clone meanwhile could barely stop looking at one another, overjoyed in their realisation that the other was safe and well enough.

"Nearly there now..." Trevor spoke deeply at last. The Pachirisu pair nodded silently once again. Just as they passed by the posse of teetering cars, one of them toppled and landed on its side below with a crash. Its roof caved in and split as it hit, the sound of which made the trio jolt suddenly in surprise. The split was caused by a jagged, uprooted portion of road that had sliced through the roof of the car and impaled it.

They stood to attention and remained wary of whether the comeuppance was the result of unnatural causes. It was not. The vehicle had fallen under its own strain and that no zombies or Blackwatch soldiers would be the cause of it.

"Take those fuckers out!" Came a sudden, shrill cry. The trio swivelled and noticed a group of six Blackwatch soldiers. They were all wielding AK47 assault rifles. They opened fire and the loud flashes of gunfire filled the vicinity, echoing with the wind. The bullets narrowly missed Cartwright and the Pachirisu pair and thudded upon the ash sodden ground and against a nearby building. The latter caused balls of dust to be thrown up on impact.

"Fuck!" The female Pachirisu gasped after two bullets whizzed past her head. The male Pachirisu kept her head tucked against him and his coat safely in the manner of a protective hug. Cartwright meanwhile fired a burst from his own assault rifle at the adversaries while ducked behind cover. The bullets sprayed the ground around the Blackwatch soldiers while they scrambled desperately for a wall between them and the bullets.

"Kill this motherfucker!" Demanded one of them hoarsely, referring to Trevor who was replacing the ammo cartridge in his firearm until it clicked into place.

The Blackwatch soldiers began another round of fire, their guns throbbed the environment with the sound of war. Cartwright embraced himself from the fire behind cover.

"This is like a fucking Pokémon battle." The Prototype muttered while he and The Dark Clone crouched behind another wall to avoid the gunfire.

However just as the Blackwatch soldiers paused again to reload, the sudden sound of shotgun fire resonated and made itself known. The soldiers looked up to their right in shock as one was blasted full on at waist level. His agony filtered through his mask while blood splattered about and the upper half of his body relieved itself entirely from the lower half. It flew back a few metres and sat slumped and bloodied against a mangled car, entrails looping and spilling across the ground.

The lower half fell to its knees spurting blood upon itself before finally, clumsily falling forward and ending its freak show in gory fashion.

"Take that, you fucking cocksucker!" Yelled a masculine voice belonging to a dreadlock styled black man wearing combat styled camouflage jacket and trousers while bucking the next shot into the chamber of his SPAS-12.

"Shit! Shotgunner! Get the motherfucker!" Ordered another of the Blackwatch soldiers as some of them quickly darted their reflexes and ACOG sights upon the dreadlocked shotgunner.

"Cease and fucking desist, you son of a bitch!" Demanded one of them hoarsely but then another sudden sound sting made itself known.

"Sniper!" Screamed another of them, having turned around just in time to witness the resulting bullet had ripped open an exit wound in a comrade's forehead. It caused a large portion of his scalp to tear away and dangle barely by a mere flap of skin on his head.

Blood erupted from the scalp's red and fleshy former home like a hissing geyser and after an expression of shock he finally, clumsily fell spread-eagled lifelessly on the ground. Watching the blood pooling around his head the other Blackwatch soldiers cursed repeatedly in disgust.

The remaining four switched their attention spans from the shotgunner to Cartwright and tried desperately to seek out the sniper. The shotgunner grinned and cocked his gun menacingly at another soldier.

"Get 'em girls!" He cried hoarsely like a battle cry. Without warning two armed young women burst out from the doors of the shack, further surprising the stunned Blackwatch grunts. Immediately they opened fire on the soldiers with their Makarov pistols, puncturing each of their heads like ripe watermelons, riddling them with many bullets apiece. Blood squirted from each wound and spilled from their mouths as they choked and gurgled their last, wasted breaths. Then they slumped dramatically to the floor atop one another, like a macabre group hug.

The women looked as if they were from a Hollywood film...every bit as stereotypically beautiful as one would come to expect. They both had brown eyes, stunning faces, long flowing blonde hair and big breasts upon their slender, model like bodies.

The Prototype deduced immediately that they must be twins since their combat camouflage outfits were identical and their bodies too looked like doubles of one another.

"I wonder what their IQs are." He quipped with a roll of the eyes quietly. The Dark Clone chuckled as a result, patting his cheek with her paw. The dreadlocked black male with the shotgun jumped down to the ground and immediately slapped the rear ends of either female twin one after the other. That caused them to giggle and the man to smirk smugly.

The Prototype shook his head. He could have sworn he had seen that in so many Hollywood blockbusters before...just not in a barren, earthquake stricken warzone and certainly not with the women toting guns. 'At least they can aim.' He thought to himself momentarily.

Cartwright emerged from cover, assault rifle pointed and swung at the ash choked ground non threateningly as he walked. He made his way over to the two pretty females and the dreadlocked African-American male. He cuffed fists with the latter and received a very brief 'bro' hug in return.

"What's up, bro?" The dreadlocked shotgunner piped up as a gesture of greeting Trevor's return, causing the latter to smile and nod.

"All good, Benji...found a pair who'll help us drive Blackwatch back too." Cartwright replied quite proudly just as a man with a powerful Barratt sniper rifle to hand showed up. Wearing a tattered white dusty vest and denim blue jeans; the skinhead, slender blue-eyed man looked at Cartwright sharply.

"Who might they be, hermano?" He asked with Latin flare in his accent. Cartwright could see his impatience and gestured by hand toward The Prototype and The Dark Clone to wander towards them. They did so and stood up from behind their cover. Turning, paw in paw, they wandered in the direction of the Blackwatch Resistance Group. The Mexican sniper's eyes widened in horror.

"Why the fuck have you brought this gringo, Cartwright? Do you have no fucking idea who this motherfucker is?"

His voice was raised and his free hand pointed an accusing finger right at the male Pachirisu who stopped. Any hint of a smile on his face evaporated there and then.

"Alberto just stop with your conspiracy theories. If he was such a fucking threat wouldn't he have killed us by now?" Cartwright retorted with a glare and then invited The Prototype and The Dark Clone over again. Deus nodded and they did so, the male Pachirisu glaring at Alberto as he did.

"Look he's fucking staring at me, gringo. He's like devil scorn!" He exclaimed, exaggerating. The dreadlocked man approached Alberto and stopped just centimetres before the Mexican. Slapping his face viciously, Alberto sprawled across the ground and kicked up the ash around him like foggy dust. Benji spoke up without remorse.

"Why don't you shut your fucking mouth, spic?"

The mouthed discrimination riled the Mexican up and he immediately sprang to his feet and grasped Benji by the throat vigorously.

"You think you can say shit like that to me and expect me to fucking accept it?" Alberto snarled bitterly before they were separated and pushed apart by a frustrated Cartwright.

"I cannot be doing with childish disagreements right now. It goes without saying. No fucking fighting and especially no fucking discrimination of any kind!" Trevor scolded with dead serious intent. Benji nodded obediently but Alberto seethed, shrugging Cartwright's hand away from him and backing off towards the shack.

"Make sure that fucker stays away from me then..." The sniper began, pointing at the dreadlocked shotgunner before switching his accusing finger and glaring eyes to The Prototype where he spoke up in conclusion.

"...and keep that motherfucker away from me too!"

With that Alberto kicked open the door of the shack and slammed it shut behind him.

"What a dick." The male Pachirisu sighed and shuffled, looking down at the ground. The Dark Clone looked at him and held him tight with her arm around his back, softly kissing his cheek in a comforting and consoling manner.

"Just ignore him, sweetcheeks. He's not worth the stress." She reassured him, making him nod. As he nodded, she shuffled him forth to the rest of the resistance group. They were both accepted with hugs, high fives and hand to paw shakes. It was then that they finally made their way into the shack to settle down for a while...


End file.
